


Old School

by jackwabbit



Category: Star Trek: Discovery
Genre: Culmets - Freeform, Established Relationship, Humor, M/M, also likely crackfic, but maybe not so much, domestic life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-09
Updated: 2020-10-09
Packaged: 2021-03-08 03:28:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 854
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26918872
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jackwabbit/pseuds/jackwabbit
Summary: Culmets. Established Relationship. Humor. Domestic Life. Quite Possibly Crackfic.Season: Post-Two, Pre-Three. (Probably?)Spoilers: General Series Knowledge Only.Summary: Paul has a new way to pass the time. Hugh doesn’t get it – until he does.Note: This is what happens when I’m watching Discovery and I get a message about something completely unrelated.
Relationships: Hugh Culber/Paul Stamets
Comments: 4
Kudos: 15





	Old School

**Author's Note:**

> For Anthony Rapp, because reasons.

Hugh comes to a dead stop as he enters his quarters.

He’s still in full uniform, and he’s exhausted after too long a shift.

So maybe he’s a little bit grumpier than he means to be when he snaps at Paul.

“Really?”

Paul doesn’t look at him. He continues with what he’s doing as if Hugh hadn’t spoken.

Hugh shakes his head, now intentionally putting a bit of snap into his voice.

“You really replicated that again?”

Paul bites his lip in concentration and still doesn’t look up, but grumbles a reply out of the side of his mouth.

“Well, I wouldn’t have had to if someone hadn’t sent my other one through the matter reclamation system.”

Hugh sighs, then walks to the bedroom, shucking off his uniform jacket as he goes. As he reaches into the closet to grab a sweatshirt, he raises his voice to continue the conversation.

“You know we’re supposed to conserve right now, Paul.”

Paul finally looks up as Hugh returns to the main room, but only for a moment. Then he’s back at it, but he answers Hugh all the same.

“I replicated that ages ago. It’s not like it was asking too much to keep it.”

Hugh gives Paul an annoyed look that is wasted on the back of his head.

“But recycling it was more responsible and you know it.”

Paul scowls.

“Whatever. You just didn’t like me using it.”

“Paul, it’s two hundred years old. It doesn’t make sense. If it’s entertainment you’re after, there are a lot better options these days.”

“Actually,” said Paul, taking that tone that sometimes made Hugh want to strangle him, “it’s twelve hundred years old now. Twelve hundred and four, to be exact.”

“That’s hardly the point,” Hugh growls.

“Then what is the point?”

“The point is it’s not even 3-D, Paul! It’s two-dimensional characters on a screen. And they’re not even lifelike! I mean, what even is that?”

Hugh gestures at the screen throwing alternating light and shadows over Paul’s face as he sits transfixed in front of it in their darkened quarters.

Paul bites his lip again and leans to one side as the characters on the screen move across it.

“It’s a…YES!”

A strange, trilling sound emanates from the screen and Paul jerks both arms in an abbreviated celebration move as one of the characters on the screen grows in size.

Paul is too distracted to finish responding to Hugh’s question, but Hugh knows the answer anyway.

His eyes grow wide and he shakes his head in disbelief as he crouches next to Paul.

“Oh, my God,” he whispers. “It’s the mushrooms, isn’t it?”

Just then, a chime rings out and the screen freezes. Paul finally looks away from it.

He gives Hugh the goofiest grin and nods.

“I know, right?”

Hugh just stares at him, so Paul continues, in a voice that would make Tilly proud.

“They make him bigger and stronger and it’s just great. I love it so much.”

Hugh stares a moment more, then starts to giggle. It’s the laugh of someone who has had a long day and has been confronted with something ridiculous. It starts small, then gets bigger. Eventually, Hugh is doubled over and holding his stomach. In between laughs, he chokes out a few actual words.

“You are such a dork.”

Paul’s laughing too as he responds.

“And you love it.”.

“God help me, I do,” answers Hugh, mostly settling down and wiping tears from his eyes, but still chuckling a bit.

Paul’s eyes go soft at that and Hugh turns serious as he reaches out to run a hand through Paul’s hair before abruptly changing the subject.

“But I’m also starving. I’m going to grab dinner. You want anything?”

Paul smiles and shakes his head.

“Nah. I already ate.”

Hugh looks around, seeing evidence of snacks all around, but nothing he’d deem nutritious is present.

“Chips don’t count as eating, Paul,” he says, raising one eyebrow at his partner.

Paul waves a hand at him dismissively.

“I had a salad for lunch.”

“Paul.”

Paul sighs.

“Fine. If I eat something you deem appropriate, will you let me play another level?”

Hugh just shakes his head, grinning and not quite believing he’s having this conversation with a grown man. But he knows he’s already lost the battle. He answers the only way he can.

“You know what? Yes. Fine. Agreed.”

Paul nods and sets down the device still gripped in his hands. Then he slowly gets up from the floor, where he’d been sitting cross-legged, and gestures to the door.

“Shall we?” he asks in an overly polite voice.

Hugh takes his arm and puts it through the crook of his elbow.

“We shall.”

They walk to the mess hall. Hugh gets a burger and Paul eats a few bites of chicken fettuccine.

Then it’s back to their quarters, where Paul resumes his position as Hugh tries to read while somehow both cursing and celebrating the day Paul encountered Super Mario Brothers (complete with original home console and controller designs, of course) in the ship’s cultural archives.


End file.
